Tag Archives: B£ cashpoint

Today we are unveiling the world’s first local currency cash machine! Designed and produced by Kind Studio, it is situated in Market Row and available in the market’s operating hours: 8am – 11:30pm Tuesday to Sunday, and 8am – 6pm on Mondays. Which means you can get your hands on paper B£s at almost any time of the day!

The cash machine will aid Brixton Pound in furthering its mission to showcase what a social economy might look like in Brixton, and will give local residents an increased opportunity to spend paper B£s to support these values and imagine a better world. It will also help us achieve our vision – that a different high street is possible.

The cash machine is funded by The Mayor’s High Street Fund, and forms part of a wide range of initiatives in Brixton supporting businesses in the town centre. The High Street Fund is helping Brixton and its existing and emerging traders, hand in hand with the innovative Brixton Pound project.

B£’s Tom Shakhli said:

“Our cash machine is the latest in our challenge to the conventional view that we’re moving towards a cashless society, and gives locals and visitors to Brixton an opportunity to experiment with money that celebrates community and creates conversations rather than closes them off.”

What and why then? We haven’t chosen this word lightly, we really are planning to pack the year with Bonuses for Brixton. Let me explain why.

To kick off, let’s introduce the Brixton Bonus itself: a local, monthly, prize draw – with a top prize of B£1000 up for grabs (alongside some more for the runners up). The chance to win is yours for a paltry £1 (or B£1), and because it’s a local gig you’re several thousands of times more likely to win than on, say, the National Lottery.

So far it looks like the Bonus is a winner-takes-all situation. Not so, indeed far from it.

The whole idea is that the Brixton Bonus is, genuinely, a bonus for Brixton. After the winner has been awarded their handsome winnings (which in turn will, of course, become a bonus for the Brixton businesses in which they’re spent…), the remaining funds will be split between the Brixton Fund – a local micro-grants scheme – and the Brixton Pound, enabling us to continue our work supporting Brixton’s businesses and local economy.

The Brixton Fund will financially support projects which meet its priorities for increasing local employment opportunities, taking action for social justice, or simply activities beneficial to the local community. We’re not being any less vague than this right now for a reason: we want the community to decide what’s most important. Watch this space.

So, you see: win or lose it’s a Bonus all round.

If you’d like to play, find out more about the Brixton Bonus & Fund, ask us a question or simply be kept in the loop in advance of the launch you can quickly register your interest here.

But the bonuses keep on flowing, we’ve also got cooking for 2015:

Contactless payment: ever pushing the boundaries of the local currency world, contactless payment is on its way, making it embarrassingly easy to spend those B£s mid-21st-century-style

Android B£ app: following hot on the heels of our iPhone App launched last summer, the Android version will be launching this year – so you’ll be able to pay in a flash, top-up on the go and search out Brixton business gems from your pocket without selling out to Apple (just Google instead…)

A new B£5 note: to celebrate 5 years of the Brixton Pound, 2nd edition note designers-extraordinaire This Ain’t Rock ’n’ Roll will be producing a special new B£5 note – we can’t tell you anything more now, but trust us, it’s gonna be good!

A B£ cashpoint: sorely missing, I think we can all agree, from Brixton’s town centre for too long now – a cashpoint dedicated to spitting out local money into your eager palms could be on its way. We’ll be waiting to hear if a funding bid has been successful sometime in February. Fingers and toes crossed please…

Not bad eh? We hope we’ve done enough to convince you that if you’re into Brixton and its trusty currency, this year could be one to remember.